There are situations when you have to download PST file from Office 365 online. Whether they are for legal reasons or for security reasons. This is a situation you are going to find yourself in eventually if you use Microsoft’s Office 365 Business suite.
In this article, we are going to be looking into how you can download Office 365 mailbox to PST. We are going to go over different methods including manual methods and an easy way using an automated professional tool. Now let us look at the different methods that we can use.
How to Download PST File From Office 365 Online USing eDiscovery?
This is a manual method that uses the eDiscovery export tool to download PST. eDiscovery is the process of finding and accessing useful information via search. eDiscovery export tool is a tool that uses this principle to help us export files from Office 365.
Let us now peek into the steps that we have to use for this method.
Steps for eDiscovery Export Tool
- The first and foremost step that we have to do is to log into your admin account in Office 365 and open EAC(Exchange Admin Centre).
- Scroll down in the admin center and select the security and compliance option.
- Go to the permissions tab and then click on eDiscovery manager.
- Click on the edit button so we can add important roles that are required for using the eDiscovery tool to download PST file from Office 365 Online.
- Click on more resources to open Microsoft Purview Compliance portal. From there select content search and start a new search by clicking on the new search button.
- In the new window that opens provide a name and description for the content search so that it is easily understandable later on.
- Fill in the required details like the location and the name of the user account that you want to download as a PST file.
- If required you can add different filters in the condition tab like language, key phrases, and other filters related to time, message fields, and file properties.
- Do note that if you want to export the entire mailbox do not apply any filters.
- Once you have selected all the requirements you need to select the submit button to start the eDiscovery search.
- The search will run in the background you can view the progress by going to the search tab.
- Once the search is completed click on the action tab and then select the export result option to download PST file from Office 365 Online.
- Enable encryption if needed before you export the data. And click on the export button.
- Once you click on the export button the process will start. You can view the status again in the content search menu.
- Once the process is completed click on the download results button and make sure you have made a copy of the unique export key.
- Now a new window will pop up with the eDiscovery export tool. Paste the unique export key that you have copied into it and navigate and define a destination on where to save the PST file.
- Click on the start button to download Office 365 mailbox to PST.
Once the process is completed you will have a PST file with all the data from your mailbox.
Drawbacks of eDiscovery Export Tool
As you can probably guess from the long list of steps this is a not simple method to execute.
Some of the major demerits of using this method are as follows.
- Since the steps that are needed to be executed are really long some users might find it overwhelming and difficult to follow through.
- It is a time-consuming process since all the steps have to be manually executed by the user.
- The selective exporting option is limited with a low number of filters.
- The user must be technically well aware and must be comfortable in working with technical steps.
How to Download Office 365 Emails to PST Using Professional Method?
As we have seen from the above there are limitations when using the manual method. Professional Office 365 Export Tool helps us to easily overcome all of these limitations and help the users to easily download PST file from Office 365 online. They have one of the best tools in the industry and are recommended and preferred by both Office 365 admins and IT professionals alike.
Steps to an Easier Method to Export PST Files
- Install and run the tool.
- From the welcome screen of the tool check on the “is admin” option. And then sign in with your admin email address and password.
- The user accounts under the admin id will be listed in the tool.
- Click on the accounts that you want to download PST file from Office 365 online and click on the next button.
- In the next menu choose the PST option and select the checkbox near split options for Outlook data files. Also, provide a size limit to split the PST file after.
- Check on the checkbox near mails and if needed you can apply a date filter to selectively export files into the PST file.
- Now click on the browse button and select a destination path to save the PST file.
- Finally, after you have selected everything as per your requirement click on the start button to download PST file from Office 365 online.
- Once the process is completed successfully you can click on the save report button to save the report file in CSV file.
- You can use the report file to verify that the exportation was successful. And that all the data was exported successfully.
Conclusion
As each day passes the number of attacks on cloud systems are increasing. Hence it is our duty to keep our data safe by having a copy locally. In this article, we have seen how you can download PST file from Office 365 Online. We have taken a look at two methods. It is clear that using the manual method is for the power users. Users who are not technically well fit might find the manual method overwhelming and difficult to execute. Therefore for a better technical experience, we recommend using the above-mentioned tool.
